Something stirred within her at last, impelling her to action.  She got up.

“Do you see that blasted tree right away over there with horrid twisted arms that look as if they are trying to clutch at something?”

His eyes came up to hers on the instant.  “What of it?” he said.

She laughed down at him.  “Let’s mount!  I’ll race you to it.”

He leapt to his feet like, a boy.  “What’s the betting?”

“Anything you like!” she threw back gaily.  “Whoever gets there first can fix the stakes.”

He laughed aloud, and the sound of his laugh made her catch her breath with a sharp, involuntary start.  She ran to her mount feeling as if Guy were behind her, and with an odd perversity she would not look round to disillusion herself.

During the fevered minutes that followed, the illusion possessed her strongly, so strongly that she almost forgot the vital importance of being first.  It was the thudding hoofs of his companion that made her animal gallop rather than any urging of hers.  But once started, with the air swirling past her and the excitement of rapid motion setting her veins on fire, the spirit of the race caught her again, and she went like the wind.

The blasted tree stood on a slope nearly a mile away.  The ground was hard, and the grass seemed to crackle under the galloping hoofs.  The horse she rode carried her with superb ease.  He was the finest animal she had ever ridden, and from the first she believed the race was hers.

On she went through the orange glow of evening.  It was like a swift entrancing dream.  And the years fell away from her as if they had never been, and she and Guy were racing over the slopes of her father’s park, as they had raced in the old sweet days of youth and early love.  She heard him urging his horse behind her, and remembered how splendid he always looked in the saddle.

The distance dwindled.  The stark arms of the naked tree seemed to be stretching out to receive her.  But he was drawing nearer also.  She could hear the thunder of his animal’s hoofs close behind.  She bent low in the saddle, gasping encouragement to her own.

There came a shout beside her—­a yell of triumph such as Guy had often uttered.  He passed her and drew ahead.  That fired her.  She saw victory being wrested from her.

She cried back at him “You—­bounder!” and urged her horse to fresh effort.

The ground sped away beneath her.  The heat-haze seemed to spin around.  Her eyes were fixed upon their goal, her whole being was concentrated upon reaching it.  In the end it was as if the ruined tree shot towards her.  The race was over.  A great giddiness came upon her.  She reeled in the saddle.

And then a hand caught her; or was it one of those outstretched skeleton arms?  For a moment she hung powerless; then she was drawn close—­close—­to a man’s breast, and felt the leap and throb of a man’s heart against her own.